Multi-point conferences have been available using a plurality of information processing terminals connected with each other through a network.
In the multi-point conference using the information processing terminals, a technique has been proposed in which the priority level of right to speak is calculated using a function which has one or more of combinations of attributes of conference participants (e.g., a social status, an official post and rank, and a specialized field), a speech accumulated time, and the number of speech times, as variables in order to smoothly advance a multi-point conference according to the purpose thereof.
See, for example, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 08-274888.
Next-generation type educations using the information processing terminals by the teachers and students have recently been conducted in educational institutions of elementary and secondary schools.
A visual discussion support system has been provided for the next-generation type education. A class is conducted in such a manner that an assignment is transmitted from a teacher's terminal to a student's terminal and each student inputs an opinion for the assignment at the student's terminal to reply to the teacher's terminal. The opinions of respective students are collected in the teacher's terminal and opinions and approvals or disapprovals of all the students are displayed in a form of a matrix shape, which serves as a shared screen between the teacher and students, in a classroom. Also, the teacher allows each student to present his opinion regarding other opinions input by other students.
Here, when all of the students (e.g., several tens of students) in a class present their opinions, the same opinions may be included in the presented opinions and thus, the contents of presented opinions may be overlapped between the opinions to cause waste of time, which is problematic. Accordingly, it is efficient for conducting a class to allow only a representative to present an opinion regarding the same opinions.
In the meantime, in the conventional technology described above, a speaker is determined among a plurality of participants based on a priority level of a right to speak in accordance with a purpose of the conference and thus, a representative speaker for the same opinions may not be determined among the collected opinions for the assignment.
Therefore, even when the conventional technology described above is used in the next generation type education, it is difficult to grasp contents of several tens of opinions collected from respective students in a class for a short time. Accordingly, a representative of the students who have been regarded as having the same opinion may not be able to present the same opinion in an efficient manner. Further, among the students, there may be a student who tries to avoid presentation by replying to the teacher's terminal that “I have the same opinion as that of Mr. XX”, in spite of that the student has a different focus on the assignment. There is a problem that such a student cannot be determined.
One aspect of the present disclosure intends to suppress a student from trying to avoid presenting his opinion.